What is life like for a 30 year old virgin Mormon living in today's society? There is so much to share about my culture, my religion, and what it means to be an anxious white virgin.

Sunday, February 10, 2013

Why Good little Mormon Girls Go Bad

Years ago a good friend of mine was living in Hollywood...you know...trying out the whole famous thing. This friend is probably one of the more beautiful women I have ever known and as such...has always attracted VERY attractive men. At one point, this friend even dated a now A-list celebrity. I am not going to name names, but you wouldn't have to Google him to know who he is. Their courtship was short lived however and my friend soon moved to Utah and shortly after that we became friends. Several years after she had moved to Utah she got a text message from said same actor informing her that he would be coming to Utah for some reason (I think filming) and wondering if she knew any "Good Little Mormon Girls" she could set him up with. She conveyed all of this to me, whereupon I inquired quite quizzically..."Why would he want a good little Mormon girl?".......

My friend informed me that said actor LOVED the naive Mormon girls because they were so "easy to corrupt".

No foolin.

To go along with that....since they have kept themselves clean all of their lives...well...you can probably finish the rest....

We have all heard the stereo-type of the Bishops Daughter. Same as the Preachers Girl if we were any other Christian domination. The idea is that these good little girls who have kept themselves clean ALL their lives are really the wildest at heart...and once they let loose...boy howdy.

You wanna know what I think? I don't think these girls were any more inherently wild than any other girl out there. I don't even think they are purposely trying to be rebellious for the sake of spiting their oppressive fathers like you see so often portrayed in the movies......"I'll show you Pa! I'll go out and sleep with the ENTIRE football, basketball, hockey, and debate team! I'll contract 17 new kinds of STD's too while I'm at it! That'll teach ya to try and teach me morals and such!".

MMmmmmmmm.....not sa much.

You wanna know what I think is more likely going on? I see it much like someone who is ALWAYS on a diet. We as humans have a biological drive for food. We are particularly drawn to high caloric and quick carbs (hence why they taste so good). This is much like our biological need for sex. So let's say that you are CONSTANTLY telling yourself that junk food ( i.e. EVERYTHING DELICIOUS IN THIS WORLD) is Bad and because it is so Bad you are not allowed to have them. Sure you can hold out for a time...you nibble your carrot stick while your friends are taking down entire cheesecakes.....but even if you are able to resist...you are gonna go home that night and dream about the things you wish you could be eating. You might have some friends that are supportive....but you are also going to have those friends who tell you that you are being silly and that "life is short so you should enjoy it while you can"....some might tell you that you are a mindless lemming to follow such a strict "diet" set forth by a bunch of old men who are completely out of touch with reality and trying to oppress your right to cheese fries and overall enjoyment of life.

Drawing the parallel?

The longer you diet and the longer you see everyone around you indulging the more insane with desire you become. We live in a world where images of food/sex are everywhere we turn. But here is where we mark the difference between the two.

When it comes to food, we obviously can't abstain. We need food to live, and so the best course most would agree would be to live a life of balance and moderation. So you eat your veggies and and your chicken breast, but every so often....you also eat a freakin' cookie. Cuz if you don't allow yourself an indulgence once in awhile...all it does is make you want that forbidden thing even more!!

Sometimes we confuse the WANTING of the thing with the THING itself.

And so it is with good little Mormon girls.

We are taught our whole lives to abstain from sex...or anything like unto sex. For many girls this isn't an issue because they get married before they even really understand what sex is. But for those girls who own a TV or a computer or eyes....it soon becomes clear that sex is a HUGE part of today's culture....All the kids are doing it....literally. And even IF you live in the merry ol' land of OZ also known as the bubble, also known as Utah, where "nobody who is LDS is having sex before marriage"....*cough cough*......it STILL doesn't save you from the fact that sex is a biological drive that probably WOULD exist inside a vacuum OR if you were raised in the wilderness by a pack of ferrule cats. But the fact that sex is:

A. Biologically Driven
B. Socially Taboo
C. Spiritually "Condemnable"

Only serves to make it THAT much more alluring. Now it has become that dark seedy secret thing that we mustn't think, speak, or act upon. Quell those feelings!!!! QUELL THEM I SAY!!! Don't think about all those wild wonderful things that you see on TV or hear your friends talking about. Never mind the fact that sex has been utterly turned into a thing of recreation much like racquet-ball. Even if sex was meant to be shared only between 2 people who deeply love one another, I think we can all agree that this is NOT the scenario in which sex is portrayed in MOST of our media.....the porn industry aside even.

So again.....you take a naive girl who has been sheltered from exploring her sexuality...add a heaping spoonful of the world telling her that she is basically the ONLY one not enjoying the most AWESOME thing EVER!!!...and sprinkle in the allure of doing something "naughty" or simply for the sake of doing what you have been told not to...and you've got a recipe for a good girl gone wild.

Just so we are clear.

I DO NOT judge anyone who chooses to have sex before marriage...be it with one person or one hundred. The sexuality and intimate practices of other people are none of my business. My philosophy is as long as you are being safe and not putting other peoples lives in danger...then live and let live. The reasons I have personally chosen to abstain from the act has more to do with rational and practical arguments and less to do with the fact that I believe God would "damn" me if I did....which I don't really believe in the first place. But that is perhaps another discussion for another day. I guess it just has always bothered me that people assume that the reason I have chosen abstinence is merely due to my Mormon background and faith. If it WERE...as is the case for many LDS people that would be FINE. There is NOTHING wrong with doing something good because you believe it to be the right thing. However, if you are doing something good for the wrong reasons...the chances of you being able to keep it up for very long without eventually giving in or becoming totally bitter and disenchanted with the thing you thought you were doing it for or in the name of or for the sake of....... are well...not too good.

What I find to be the most tragic part of this are those who have built up sex to be the end-all be-all of creation. They buy into the hype of the movies and locker room talk and that curiosity starts to grow in direct proportion to their need to "deny" themselves of this dark yet alluring thing. And then one day...after they can no longer force themselves to choke down one more proverbial celery stick...they snap! And as the scriptures say.....Great was the fall thereof. Like any person who has "messed up" on their diet.

"Dang it! I messed up and ate one cookie...well...guess I might as well eat the whole bag! My diet is shot anyway!"

"Dang it! I messed and and did such and such with a guy...well..guess I might as well just see what the big freaking deal is all about! My virtue is shot anyway!" (As if virtue is like a bottle rocket that once fired is rendered totally useless and void)

These people often come to that the entire bag of cookies didn't taste as good as they thought it would. They realize that the night after the entire bag of cookies they feel worse then they did before they indulged. And maybe they don't feel guilty per say...but they simply realize that all the hype and mystery they had built up about those cookies now seems so very.....unimpressive. Delicious yes....but hardly earth shattering.

I do not speak these things from experience...but from the testimony of Mormon AND non-Mormon alike.

As with all things in life, we need to be sure we are being honest with ourselves about why we are doing them. We must be true to ourselves...no matter what path that takes us down.

In conclusion, I would invite you to listen to a song I feel illustrates this concept of being seduced by the forbidden. It is a personal favorite of mine. Enjoy.

This reminds me of back when I opposed gay marriage on what I thought were purely rational and secular grounds. Interestingly enough, once I discarded my belief in the myths of Mormonism (and religion in general), all these supposedly 'logical' grounds seemed unconvincing to me.

I suspect something similar would happen to your views on premarital sex if you were to experience such a paradigm shift.